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Merlin brought out a small but shiny box from the back of his shop. The black box in his hand gave off incredible pressure and even someone with dull senses like Kieth felt the power.

Merlin dusted off the top of the box with his breath and held the box out for Keith to see.

"This is an ancient item that was entrusted to me by a god a long time ago. I am not sure how much use it will be to someone who is not its intended use but you can have it for the time being."

Keith was hesitant to hold the small black box in his hand. He knew what was in this box since it was a quest reward in the game.

'The stone of power.'

It was the best starter item one could get in the original MMO but only after the user performed flawlessly in the previous quest. From what Keith remembered, it was one of the quests that were notoriously difficult to complete so most people gave up, never mind completing it.

But of course, some 'gamers' were different and ended up unlocking this hidden prize.

'And now it is in my hand.'

Keith took the box and opened it. It contained a small red stone and nothing else. The stone was only the size of Keith's one tooth and it looked fragile to touch.

"Are you going to see this stone to me?"

Keith asked as he held the small stone in his hand. He was so glad he had visited this shop today.

Now, Keith did not know if any of the protagonists had already visited this shop before or not, but he was quite lucky to find this stone still in the shop.

"Sell it? Over my dead body. I am lending, and I do mean *lending* this stone to you. We will even draw a contract to endure you give this stone back to me."

Merlin snapped angrily and tried to take the stone back from Keith. In terms of strength, Merlin was much more powerful than Keith currently was and it was not even a contest.

Keith let the stone go, not wanting to contest against Merlin.

"Alright, let's sign the contract now."

Merlin looked at Keith with a keen expression of awareness. Suddenly, Merlin had a feeling he should not sell this stone to Keith but the promise had already been made.

"Give me a sec and I will get you the contract. Do not touch anything else in this shop if you value your life."

Merlin warned and disappeared behind the curtain. Keith was curious about what was going on behind the curtain but he decided it was more important to gain Merlin's trust.

It took no time for Merlin to come back and he handed Keith a piece of paper along with a red pen.

"Here, this is an oath pen. I want you to sign your name here and you will be ready to go home with the stone."

Keith debated having someone look over the contract first before he signed but that plan risked incurring Merlin's wrath.

Merlin had a reputation for being fair and just in the original game. He was a wizard who prided himself on not cheating others out of a contract, even if he did demand atrocious prices sometimes.

Luckily for Keith, he could afford any price Merlin came up with. Especially more so with the new diamond business, he had started under Master Fushi.

He quickly read over the contract, flinched internally at the atrocious price he saw, and then signed the deal.

"Good, good, now we have a contract. This stone is all yours but remembers- do not scratch it or lose it. Now then, what else can I get for you?"

"I'll look around for something more to buy. I will call if I need you."

Merlin did not stick around after that and Keith quickly looked around the room. There was not much in the room to see but Keith could still spot a few tinkers he had seen in the game.

But since Keith did not remember any of them being important, he did not go for them.

He exited the shop with a new mana stone and thousands of dollars short of cash.

He followed Amelia's message to meet at the central plaza and soon found his two companions. Amelia was glowing with happiness, her eyes blazing and her hands filled with bags.

On the other hand, Clair looked tired and miserable. She seemed to have done no shopping of her own and her face looked hagged as Keith had expected it to look.

"Are you done now? Can we head home? I think I am developing a small headache because of all this roaming around."

Clair complained with a white face. Keith decided to hold back on giving her Merlin's contract to look over.

Amelia had an embarrassed look on her face and tried to hide behind the wall of bags in her arms. She had gone overboard with shopping since she had the money for the first time in her life.

And Keith was sure Amelia would lament all her shopping spree later once she had calmed down and thought over her actions. After all, the money she had used had not been hers.

......…

Once Keith was back in his room, he looked at the stone in his hand. It was shining with a dull color in his hand right now but it would get brighter as soon as it would absorb an ability.

This stone was a cheat item that only the best players in the original MMO got but it was not the ultimate cheat item.

There were many limitations when this stone was used.

First, its stored power could not go over a threshold and could never exceed the original user of the stored skill. Second, the stronger the skill, the longer it will take to recharge the usage time.

The one-day per usage was the average people had calculated in the original game so the exact time might vary depending on the skill.

And then there was one more disadvantage of this stone - it could only store human skills. Anything that utilized divine or devil mana could not be stored in this mana stone. That eliminated more than 75% of the abilities in the MMO's later stage.

'But overall, this is a decent item I got for no effort. I should hurry up and store an ability in this.'

Keith was excited to try and wield mana. The first person he wanted to try out was Shinzou. As the second-in-command of the guild, Shinzou sure had a lot of skills at his disposal.

But Keith needed to be sneaky. He needed to take a skill that would not make people doubt his authenticity as the 'grandmaster' so all of Shinzou's fire skills were out.

The next day, Keith went out in search of Shinzou and finally tracked the man in the training ring. Shinzou was going through the motions of his kata, each strike precise and controlled.

Keith felt his hand twitch in the need to follow along but he stopped his body from moving along to that motion.

People were looking at him now and Keith needed to not show his weakness.

So he coughed to get Shinzou's attention but everyone turned to look at him when Keith coughed. They all looked up at Keith in awe, his presence commanding people to stop and pay attention to him.

Shinzou, who finally noticed Keith's presence was startled. He was ashamed that he had lost his focus and not noticed when the grandmaster had walked into the training grounds.

'As expected of the grandmaster. His aura is so massive that I am not able to notice it. I will need to train harder from today so that I can catch up to him.'

Shinzou vowed in his mind as he stopped his practice. He quickly went up to where the grandmaster was and bowed in front of him.

"Grandmaster, how can I help you? You did not need to come all the way here if you needed me. You should have just called for me and I would have come to you."

Shinzou looked like an overexcited puppy, ready to please Keith. Keith pretended he did not hear Shinzou's words as he took out the small mana stone.

"I do need you to do something for me Shinzou. Aid me in my experiment and hold this stone for a minute."

Shinzou took the offered red stone with a confused look on his face.

The stone felt like a mana stone used by the unskilled to hold external abilities but the grandmaster did not need such a cheap trick.

'Ah, it's an experiment. I should not think too much about the grandmaster's intentions since I will never be able to understand them.'

Shinzou kept on standing where he was with his fist open and the red stone held in his hand.